PC Study Bible Data
It was about that time that the mother of the
Zebedee brothers came with her two sons and knelt before Jesus with a request.
"What do you want?" Jesus asked.
She said, "Give your word that these two sons of mine will be
awarded the highest places of honor in your kingdom, one at your right hand,
one at your left hand."
Jesus responded, "You
have no idea what you're asking." And he said to James and John, "Are you capable of drinking the cup that
I'm about to drink?"
They said, "Sure, why not?"
Jesus said, "Come
to think of it, you are going to drink my cup. But as to awarding places of
honor, that's not my business. My Father is taking care of that."
When the ten others heard about this, they lost their tempers,
thoroughly disgusted with the two brothers. So Jesus got them together to
settle things down. He said, "You've
observed how godless rulers throw their weight around, how quickly a little
power goes to their heads. It's not going to be that way with you. Whoever
wants to be great must become a servant. Whoever wants to be first among you
must be your slave. That is what the Son of Man has done: He came to serve, not
be served — and then to give away his life in exchange for the many who are
held hostage."-- Matt
20:20-28 (from THE MESSAGE: The
Bible in Contemporary Language © 2002 by Eugene H. Peterson. All rights
reserved.)
Working through this series on the 12
traditions of AA and the church is good for me. I am struck by some of the
responses to it, and have been forced to think through what I see as different
in how in general terms the church is organized
and how AA is organized. One post even garnered a response in a friend’s blog.
You can read it here along with my
initial response to his criticisms.
I’m struck by the taught dichotomy
between the direct teachings of Jesus and the teaching of Paul and the apostles
to the NT church. It seems to me, and I could be off base here, that we can’t
simply dismiss the teaching of Jesus about authority in favor of a more Hellenistic
understanding of authority that modern teachers get from Paul.
Jesus had a bunch of people following
him because they thought Jesus was going to make them a “somebody”. He
repeatedly pushed back against the idea.
·
“If you want to be first you have to be last…” (Mt 19)
·
“If you want to save your life you have to lose it” (Mt 10 & 16, Mk 8, Lk 9 & 17)
·
“Take up your cross and follow me.” (Mt 16, Mk 8, Lk 9)
·
“But the greatest among you shall be your servant.” (Mt 23)
·
“If anyone among you wants to be first, they must be last of all
and servant of all” (Mk 9)
·
“The one who is the greatest among you, must become like the
youngest, and the leader like the servant.” (Lk 22)
Later in the Biblical story Paul was
helping a small often struggling church organize in world that didn’t seem to want
it around. He fought against people that questioned his apostleship. He battled
some really weird and wonderful heresies, and people who took authority in the
church to lead it astray.
The New Testament church is encouraged
to appoint elders & deacons. And apparently they are to at the very least “care
for and apply themselves to” their congregations. Six times Paul uses the Greek
word: proïst¢mi which means – “direct,
be at the head of, manage; care for; apply oneself to”. as he speaks about Church leadership. It is funny how we automatically
jump to the conclusion that Paul must be telling those men to “rule”, “manage”,
or “direct” their congregations,
Paul and Jesus don’t have to be at
loggerheads on this issue. Paul could simply be urging his elders in light of
what Jesus said to apply themselves to and care for the congregations give over
to their care.
This is not a question of authority. Jesus
had authority. He taught with authority, He healed with authority. He forgave
sins which took authority. He cast out demons authoritatively. He even raised
the dead. Jesus had authority. And then in Mat 28 he gave that authority to his
followers. John spells it out a little differently. “As the Father has sent me,
I am sending you.” (Jn 20)
Jesus personified the bullet list
above. He was the servant. He came as a babe, and grew up among the people to
the point that many rejected him because he was too familiar. He had been a lad
playing in the street in their midst. He was last. He took up his cross and
forfeited his life. Then he told his disciples – the 12 apostles to go the way
he came to them.
Jesus had authority but it was not his
own. It came from the Father and manifested itself through the Spirit of God
working through him. The disciples also had authority but it was not because of
their position as apostles. Like Jesus, it was because of the Spirit which
indwelt them. Too often today, church leaders have authority because of their
position. They are like the disciples seeking to sit on the right and the left
of Jesus in his Kingdom. “Jesus, aren’t you lucky to have me,” they utter under
their breath so that no one, including themselves might hear.
AA leaders have authority but it is
not their own. Their authority is simply the twelve steps and twelve traditions,
what has been given to them by those that came before them.
I pondered authority in the 12 step
rooms. There is authority there. Sponsors
have incredible authority in the lives of their sponsees. One NA old timer told
the story of being told to get a haircut twice within an hour by his sponsor
simply because his sponsor didn’t like the first one he got and wanted to see
how willing the sponsee was. That sponsor probably abused his authority in that
instance, but similar stories are not uncommon in recovery rooms.
A major difference between that
sponsor and the abusive pastor is that the sponsor didn’t ask to sponsor the
sponsee. The sponsee asked him to sponsor him and gave him whatever authority
he had. In the church, “sponsors” (pastors) look for “sponsees” (disciples),
taking authority over them in direct disobedience to Jesus. In recovery,
sponsees look for sponsors, giving authority to them.
Being a sponsor is no fun. You start
with a completely self obsessed, hurting, grandiose, childish, and oversensitive
person calling you every day and telling you all the stuff that is going through
their crazy, often disgusting minds. Sponsors sponsor to remember the craziness
that used to flow around in their cranial cavity. They do it because they know
that the only way that they can hope to hang onto all the gifts that they have
been given is to give them away. They do not do it for the position of
authority it gives them in another human being’s life. It is a lot of
painstaking thankless work. They do it in order to learn to love. And teach
others to love.
Too often I fear that pastors find their
authority, not given by God but by the nature of their position. This is the
problematic authority which has ruled much of the church for much of its
history. It is the authority that leads to spiritual abuse, manipulation and
destroys lives. It is what is visible to a world that distrusts anything associated
with the church.
It is in contrast to the authority of
Jesus which was not / is not problematic. Jesus never tried to force his ways
upon anybody. He never once tried to control another human or tried to
manipulate them into behaving in a way that he thought would be better for
them. That was not the authority he practiced. He did not manage his disciples
but rather won them over with attraction rather than promotion. We need to get
back to this kind of authority.
And what I now think is true, is that
the model of AA helps facilitate a Jesus leadership more than a historic church
model which has proven to be Machiavellian too many times.
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